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Each quarter of an hour or so, an older diesel-powered railway carriage arrives at a spray-painted stop. Close by, a law enforcement alarm cuts through the almost continuous traffic drone. Commuters hurry past falling apart, ivy-covered fencing panels as rain clouds gather.

It is perhaps the last place you expect to find a well-established grape-growing plot. But James Bayliss-Smith has cultivated 40 mature vines sagging with plump purplish grapes on a rambling allotment situated between a row of 1930s houses and a commuter railway just above the city downtown.

"I've noticed people concealing heroin or other items in the shrubbery," states Bayliss-Smith. "But you simply continue ... and continue caring for your grapevines."

The cameraman, 46, a documentary cameraman who also has a kombucha drinks business, is not the only urban winemaker. He's pulled together a loose collective of growers who make wine from four hidden city grape gardens nestled in private yards and allotments throughout the city. It is too clandestine to have an official name yet, but the collective's messaging chat is named Vineyard Dreams.

Urban Wine Gardens Across the Globe

So far, Bayliss-Smith's allotment is the only one listed in the City Vineyard Network's forthcoming world atlas, which features better-known urban wineries such as the 1,800 plants on the slopes of Paris's renowned artistic district neighbourhood and more than 3,000 grapevines overlooking and inside Turin. The Italian-based charitable organization is at the vanguard of a movement reviving urban grape cultivation in traditional winemaking countries, but has discovered them throughout the world, including cities in Japan, South Asia and Uzbekistan.

"Vineyards assist cities remain greener and more diverse. They preserve land from construction by establishing permanent, productive agricultural units inside cities," explains the organization's leader.

Like all wines, those created in urban areas are a result of the soils the vines grow in, the unpredictability of the weather and the people who care for the fruit. "A bottle of wine embodies the charm, community, environment and history of a city," notes the spokesperson.

Mystery Eastern European Variety

Back in Bristol, the grower is in a race against time to gather the vines he cultivated from a plant abandoned in his garden by a Eastern European household. Should the rain comes, then the birds may seize their chance to attack once more. "This is the mystery Polish grape," he says, as he cleans damaged and mouldy grapes from the glistering clusters. "We don't really know their exact classification, but they are certainly hardy. In contrast to premium grapes – Burgundy grapes, white wine grapes and other famous European varieties – you need not treat them with chemicals ... this could be a unique cultivar that was bred by the Eastern Bloc."

Collective Activities Across the City

Additional participants of the collective are also taking advantage of sunny interludes between bursts of autumn rain. At a rooftop garden overlooking the city's shimmering waterfront, where medieval merchant vessels once bobbed with casks of vintage from France and the Iberian peninsula, Katy Grant is harvesting her dark berries from approximately fifty plants. "I adore the smell of the grapevines. The scent is so evocative," she says, stopping with a container of grapes slung over her arm. "It's the scent of Provence when you open the vehicle windows on vacation."

Grant, fifty-two, who has devoted more than two decades working for charitable groups in war-torn regions, inadvertently inherited the grape garden when she returned to the UK from Kenya with her family in recent years. She experienced an strong responsibility to maintain the grapevines in the yard of their new home. "This vineyard has previously endured multiple proprietors," she says. "I deeply appreciate the idea of environmental care – of passing this on to future caretakers so they continue producing from this land."

Sloping Gardens and Natural Winemaking

A short walk away, the remaining cultivators of the collective are hard at work on the precipitous slopes of the local river valley. One filmmaker has established more than 150 plants perched on ledges in her expansive property, which tumbles down towards the silty River Avon. "Visitors frequently express amazement," she says, indicating the tangled vineyard. "They can't believe they can see rows of vines in a urban neighborhood."

Today, Scofield, 60, is picking clusters of deep violet Rondo grapes from lines of vines arranged along the hillside with the assistance of her child, her family member. The conservationist, a documentary producer who has contributed to Netflix's nature programming and BBC Two's Gardeners' World, was inspired to plant grapes after seeing her neighbor's vines. She has learned that hobbyists can produce intriguing, enjoyable traditional vintage, which can command prices of upwards of seven pounds a serving in the increasing quantity of establishments focusing on low-processing wines. "It's just deeply rewarding that you can actually create quality, traditional vintage," she says. "It's very fashionable, but really it's resurrecting an old way of making wine."

"When I tread the grapes, all the natural microorganisms come off the skins and enter the liquid," explains the winemaker, partially submerged in a bucket of tiny stems, seeds and red liquid. "This represents how vintages were historically produced, but commercial producers add preservatives to kill the natural cultures and then incorporate a commercially produced culture."

Difficult Environments and Creative Approaches

In the immediate vicinity sprightly retiree another cultivator, who inspired Scofield to establish her grapevines, has gathered his companions to harvest white wine varieties from the 100 vines he has arranged precisely across multiple levels. Reeve, a northern English PE teacher who taught at Bristol University developed a passion for wine on annual sporting trips to Europe. But it is a challenge to grow Chardonnay grapes in the humidity of the gorge, with temperature fluctuations moving through from the nearby estuary. "I wanted to make French-style vintages here, which is a bit bonkers," admits Reeve with a smile. "Chardonnay is late to ripen and very sensitive to mildew."

"My goal was creating Burgundian wines in this environment, which is rather ambitious"

The unpredictable local weather is not the sole challenge encountered by grape cultivators. The gardener has had to install a fence on